Wednesday, 10 June 2015

These are in no particular order, but these are things that
all Java programmers should probably know.

Who Invented Java, and when?
James Gosling, at Sun Labs, around 1992; the group was building a
set-top box and started by "cleaning up" C++ and wound up with a
new language and runtime.

What does Java stand for?
Java is not an acronym (not even Just Another Vague Acronym :-)).
The language was first named Oak, after the tree outside James'
window. The lawyers found a computer company called Oak so, legend
has it, the gang went out to the local cafe to discuss names and
wound up naming it Java; the "0xCafeBabe" magic number in the
class files was named
after the Cafe where the Java team used to go for coffee.

Why is there no printf-like function in Java?
Actually there are! This was fixed in Java 5; see Java Cookbook (2nd Edition) Chapter 9.
Java 5 (J2SE 1.5) includes printf (and scanf), String.format(), and lots more.

What is the GOF book?
The Gang Of Four book is entitled Design Patterns, by
Erich Gamma, Richard Helm, Ralph Johnson and John Vlissides.
This is a very good book. You should read it. Not when you're
just learning Java, but when you've let it sink in for about six months.

What else do I need to know?
Everything! But nobody can know everything about Java - the subject
is now too vast. Imagine somebody saying that they know everything
about every single Microsoft product and technology. If someone like
that calls me, I'm always out.